I was in London, having arrived in Britain on the Queen Mary in her troopship guise. (Last week, we we saw her at her permanent dock in Long Beach, California.)

After some passes to London, where I had - and still have - relatives, one of my cousins saw me off at London's Euston Station on June 6th - as we were hearing the news of D-Day - as I left by train for my assignment with the Fifth Infantry Division, with which I landed at Omaha Beach exactly thirty days later.

Those thirty days were an enormous safety factor.

From there, it was the Grand Tour across the Continent - you know which one.